Christian Living/
Practical Theology

Dear Wormtongue,
Before we get to the primary reason for our letter, we want to begin by commending you for the most excellent job you’ve done in your well orchestrated effort to convince your patient to keep his faith …Read More

In John 11, Jesus weeps. His tears, shed in response to Lazarus’ death and Mary and Martha’s grief, are full of embodied truth, beauty, and goodness. Why did Jesus weep? He delayed coming to Bethany “so that the Son …Read More

The kingdom of God is at war. The promise from the beginning was that the seed of the woman, our King, would come and crush the head of the seed of the serpent (Gen. 3:15). Jesus’ first step out …Read More

God created us to worship him, which is His prerogative as God (Ps. 95:6; Rev. 4:11; 14:7). Humans are at their best when they are worshipping the triune God, just as they are at their worst when …Read More

As far as John Calvin was concerned, almost nothing was more urgent for the church than the reformation of pastoral ministry. For centuries, most ministers had been shockingly ignorant of the Scriptures and thus ill-equipped to preach the gospel. As …Read More

In the coming days, we will see a lot of what Scripture has to say about God’s holiness. We will also see how His holiness informs both His love and His wrath. No doubt, too, we will recognize that …Read More

As birthdays go, it’s a big one. It is fitting and appropriate that we would mark the five-hundredth anniversary of the birth of John Calvin. Trouble is, that occasion is being marked in at least two different ways. First …Read More

If I have heard it once, I’ve heard it a thousand times: “A Calvinist evangelist? Isn’t that an oxymoron? Calvinism undermines evangelism.” This accusation has been repeated so many times that few make the effort to argue it …Read More

I suppose it’s a fault. I’m sure that my wife who remembers every name, place, and date for the last fifty years thinks so. But, for some reason, I find it difficult to recall details of the past …Read More

Satan watches for those vessels that sail without a convoy,” wrote Puritan pastor George Swinnock (1627–1673). Every individual knows he was created for community. Isolation is the Devil’s playground, and our Enemy is on the lookout for the …Read More

In The Brothers Karamazov, Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s Grand Inquisitor offers this insight into fallen human nature: “So long as man remains free he strives for nothing so incessantly and so painfully as to find someone to worship.” Though the Grand …Read More

In 2005, I make my first trip to the Middle East. I was there to engage in a Christian-Muslim dialogue sponsored by a local university’s Muslim and Christian student associations. As far as we knew, it would be the …Read More

I remember well the student’s written response during a summer course on the church and sacraments. One of the course goals was to help students understand biblical and theological guidelines for worship. The response was both encouraging and dismaying …Read More

One of my many weaknesses is that I don’t, at least in my heart, believe that missionaries have weaknesses. I see them as super-heroes. How wonderful they must be to leave the comforts of home and family to go …Read More